Nurses on Living Wills and DNR's

A recent report from AOL news says that a woman named Kerrie Wooltorton,26, of eastern England, was let to die because of a living will. Apparently, 3 days before she took antifreeze, she made a living will which states all her wishes from the doctors in the event that she gets rushed to the hospital for attempted suicide. She also stated that she will call an ambulance and ask to be brought to the hospital not to seek medical intervention but to die comfortably because she didn’t want to die alone.

Though the woman’s relatives said that doctors should have done something, the physicians were in a double-bind because of the clarity of her wishes, her knowledge of the consequences of her actions (which were also detailed in the will) and the fact that she was considered mentally competent.

Dealing with this kind of situation has been a major dilemma not only for doctors but for all professionals in health care. If ever they defy the patient’s wishes and resuscitate them and in turn live in an invalid state, nurses and doctors would get sued for not following  requests and not respecting his wishes. If health care workers don’t do anything and let the patient die as he/she requested, the verdict will still fall upon the doctors and the nurses. Relatives may say that they should have disregarded the request and ruled the patient in as incompetent so they could make medical decisions on the patient’s behalf, pointing out the argument that a person who would want to end his/her life is not something that a mentally sound person would do. Pro life groups and associations would call the nurses and doctors on duty as “unethical” and does not not support patient advocacy.

This kind of issue together with euthanasia has long been debated upon. Whether or not to follow these kind of requests is a difficult thing because it is not merely deciding what would be the best for the patient (unlike in other medical conditions and interventions) but straightforwardly deciding between life and death, or maybe debilitation or death, nevertheless, in this situation, it will always be the health professional that will be caught in the middle.

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If you get caught in this kind of situation, what would you do? Leave a comment, share your thoughts and let us know what you think.